1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to input data processing devices, data processing methods and computer program products. In particular, the invention relates to an input data processing device, a data processing method and a computer program product excellent in graphical user interface function and versatility.
2. Description of the Related Art
Printer drivers have conventionally used a graphical user interface (hereinafter “GUI”) for allowing a user to enter a predetermined command. Such printer drivers having the graphical user interface presents, to a user, a structural drawing of printer hardware so as to enable the user to select a desired function from the structural drawing. For example, the user can select a desired paper type by merely indicating any tray, which holds sheets of the desired paper type, on the structural drawing.
This GUI detects which part of the structural drawing on a display is indicated by the user, by comparing coordinate information on the indicated position on the display and the structural drawing of the printer to determine a relation between the indicated position on the display and the corresponding position on the structural drawing.
However, printers of different models have respective component structures different from each other so that respective structural drawings of the printers to be displayed are not the same. Then, development of printer drivers has been required to establish, for each printer model, a relation between coordinate information on indicated positions on the display and the structural drawing of the printer. In other words, for each printer model, data must newly be prepared that shows a relation between coordinate data and a printer structure, which results in an inconvenience that, each time a new printer model is produced, data adapted to the new printer model must newly be prepared. In order to prepare such data, it is necessary to input which region of the coordinate system corresponds to which component of a printer, for example paper supply tray, for each region of the coordinate system. In particular, if the printer has a great number of components or the coordinate system includes complicated regions, preparation of such data is considerably troublesome.